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Ontario gives $1.5 million for job training in GTA

The Ontario government will spend $1.5 million over the next two years to create more commercial bakers, metal workers and social science grads with high-tech skills — all fields employers say they struggle to fill.

Premier Kathleen Wynne announced Tuesday the province will spend $750,000 on a joint project with George Brown College to train 92 unemployed and under-employed youth for commercial baking and metal work jobs.

Wynne also pledged $800,000 for a joint project with Ryerson University to create 120 jobs in the high-tech sector for graduates in the social sciences and humanities. The program could offer short-term training and job placements to give liberal arts grads the sort of tech-savvy skills in “information communication technology” that many science students already earn during their studies.

The projects are part of the province’s new $25 million Youth Skills Connections program to link employers, post-secondary institutions, government and young people to find ways to tackle labour shortages over the next two years.

“Young people still need help from employers, from communities, from all of us” to get their footing in the world, said Wynne, who was speaking to education and business leaders at the province’s first summit on Talent and Skills in the New Economy.

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“We believe building up the talent and skills of our people is the gateway to growth in Ontario,” said Wynne to hundreds of educators and employers. “Some of these projects will connect young people with industry leaders so they can get training opportunities and develop the key skills they need to succeed in today’s economy.

Wynne challenged everyone in the room to come up with one initiative to help develop talent and skills in Ontario, “and when you’ve developed it, I invite you to put it on Twitter at hashtag #ONJobs.”

The conference held panels that dealt with the often touchy subject of which kind of education best prepares young people for jobs — applied, career-focussed programs like those at community colleges, or the liberal arts studies more common at universities?

Rick Miner, former president of Seneca College and author of a powerful report on the mismatch between the job market and workforce, warned “there are more students taking humanities than those taking computer science, engineering, math and IT together,” which he said leads to “higher student debt and increased student and parent dissatisfaction.”

Yet prosperity guru Roger Martin, former dean of the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, said employers have told him they find science and engineering grads don’t always bring the sort of empathy and creativity they’re looking for. Martin said it may be easier to teach humanities grads the technical skills they need, than to teach technical wizards a sense of creativity and empathy.

“The new meta-skill of the next century should be innovation, which is something that can be taught – we teach it at Rotman,” said Martin. “Ontario should become the first jurisdiction to teach innovation from Kindergarten to Grade 12.”

Ryerson President Sheldon Levy agreed that innovation can be taught – “the idea that it has to be in your DNA is absolutely wrong.” Levy said innovation happens when you encourage students to tackle problems and give them the skills to develop a plan to solve them.

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Ryerson’s innovation “incubator” called the Digital Media Zone connects students who have a business plan to potential investors, and has grown from 6000 square feet to 60,000 square feet, said Levy.

“But there’s nothing more important to a start-up than a customer,” he noted, “so I challenge everyone here to be start-up-friendly.”

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